Instagram Now Open for Advertising

Instagram has finally joined the likes of Facebook and Twitter, opening up their advertising API (application programming interface) to partners, enabling marketers to buy into Instagram ads and plan automated digital ad campaigns through the photo-based social network. This is good news for businesses that would benefit from the highly visual medium.Facebook purchased Instagram in 2012 and is leading the photo-sharing app in its digital advertising footsteps, transforming it into a mobile advertising platform to rival Google and Twitter. News of exciting updates to Instagram’s ad platform came nearly two months ago on Instagram’s official blog, and it looks like the API has now been officially switched on.

Regarding the update, an Instagram representative said, “The Instagram Ads API will help us make ads more relevant to the community, serve more diverse business objectives, and make buying on the platform easier for advertisers. We started working with a group of Facebook Marketing Partners a few weeks ago and they’ve brought great experience and technological savvy onto the platform. We’ll continue to build upon the Instagram Ads API in the coming weeks and months.”

Instagram launched ad capabilities nearly two years ago, but in the past, marketers looking to advertise on Instagram would have found the process daunting, expensive, and time-consuming. They would have had to make special arrangements directly with an Instagram sales representative and be willing to invest in serious time and budget, which limited which businesses could engage in the ads service on the popular photo-sharing platform.

Now, the Instagram Ad API will offer similar capabilities to Facebook’s ad-targeting tools and enable marketers to easily build relevant ads with a custom-scaled budget. Third-party partners who have already been announced include Hootsuite and Salesforce Marketing Cloud, among others, whose partnerships will bring ease into supporting advertising objectives through Instagram.

We see lots of potential for use of the mobile advertising platform, especially for retailers, restaurants, and automotive. It may be time to start thinking about Instagram ads as a valuable spend of marketing budget and a way to reach potential customers right on their mobile phones.